Another Day Out

One Saturday morning , while having our breakfast at around 8:30 AM, hubby was telling me about something he read in one magazine featuring events for the week end. He said, he forgot to asked me the night before if im interested to see a falcon hunting show in Alter do Chão, Alentejo.Show starts at 10:30 AM, we might not make on time if we decide to go.

As hubby is not familiar with the place, he could´nt tell me how far or how long will it take for us to travel to the place.We checked our map to locate the area and calculate the distance ,its about 200 kms. drive from Lisbon! We´ll not make it to see the show on time but as i wanted to go and see another new place in Portugal, I tried to enticed him by reading a typical menu speciality of a restaurant nearby the place. As expected,"Prepare yourself quick and lets go!" That order was music to my ears..hahaha!

The drive to Alter do Chão was a pleasant one, it took us 2 hrs to get there and as we entered the village,this was what greeted our eyes..A small pleasant looking village and I did´nt expect to see another 13th century
"Castelo" in the area.




We stoped by the tourism offuce in this building below and took the photo next across the building.



We decided to have our lunch before proceeding to" Coudelaria Real" (Royal Stud Farm) an institution founded during the reign od King João V in 1748.

For lunch, we started with, "Quejo curado"cured cheese of the region (usually from goats milk), "Torresmos" crispy fried pork belly, olives and again " Pão Alentejano" bread from Alentejo. And for the main dish, hubby had "Pesinhos de Coentrada" (young porks feet with lots of coriander)Not my kind of food but its one of the speciality in the region, and i did eat a piece, it was good! Anyway, I ordered "Borrego no forno com arroz amarelo (yellow rice)"a baked lamb chops with safron rice.As for dessert we had a tarte called "Tecomeco" exquisite name for dessert but was also good as it was made of almonds,egg yolk and white pumpkin sweet.We ate very well!! Ahhh! and a very good house wine from the region! For everything that we ate, hubby only paid 27.50 Euros!! Quiet cheap is´nt it?



After lunch, we then proceeded to Coudelaria Real where we were told we could have a guided tour for the sum of 3 Euros. We had a wonderful time! We first went to the Museum where they have collections of medieval sadles ,arms and armours used during that period, then the best of them all are the famous Lusitania horses , some arab horses anf a cross breed of lusitano and iberian horses, falcons and others. We had a wonderful day!!
Below is a collage of the photos i took that day at the Coudelaria Real.
Pls click to enlarge photos